OPEN LETTER TO TEXAS GOV. ABBOTT & REPUBLICAN LEGISLATORS

by Ruth A. Sheets

It is often possible to know when a political party or position is morally and ideas bankrupt.  One way, it manufactures crimes to charge individuals from groups they don't like.  Republicans and conservatives in general, and Texas in particular, have reached moral-bankruptcy (and you are pretty close to ideas-bankruptcy too).   Unfortunately for our nation, the infection is spreading. 

In one current case, Melissa Lucio, a mother of many children is facing execution on April 27, 2022 for the murder of her 2-year-old daughter Mariah — a crime that never occurred. Mariah died two days after accidentally falling down a steep flight of stairs in a new home.  The child had a disability that made maintaining her balance difficult.  Ms. Lucio has maintained her innocence on death row for more than 14 years, because of course, she is innocent.  If she were not innocent, the police and prosecutors would not have used coercion to get her to confess to something she had not done.  There is no evidence that she ever abused any of her children in any way.  So, why kill this innocent woman? 

Every parent worries about accidents that can befall a child and when they occasionally happen, the parents don't get charged and put on death row for it, that is, if they are white and wealthy.  Over the years, the Texas criminal justice system has proven itself racist and sexist too, a double-whammy!  How can any woman or person of color ever believe there is justice in Texas?  They can't.  Unless the accused are white, wealthy, and a citizen, oh yes, and straight too, justice is a toss-up at best.  (I just remembered that Texas Republicans are homophobic and transphobic too.) 

Oh, Texas Governor and Republican legislators, I don't know who you are trying to impress.  Why the continuing need to kill an innocent woman?  Is it your warning to the people of Texas, to the country, of what people can expect if Republicans get more power?  I know that governors of Texas, at least Republican ones in recent decades have held it as a badge of honor to see how many death row inmates they can kill on their watch with their execution pen, and it is clear at least some of the executed in recent years have actually been innocent.

I know of no remorse on the part of any Republican governor of Texas, in fact, signing execution orders is one of the things that got George W. Bush elected president.  He had no real skills, no real ideas, could be manipulated rather efficiently into wars and other actions, but could come off as a guy "tough on crime" because of the number of death warrants he had signed as Texas governor.   Is that your goal, Mr. Abbott, to be President of the United States?  Are you running up your numbers so people will think you are worthy of being in any office beyond governor of Texas?

I hope not, but it is such a Republican thing to do in the past few decades.  The difference now is that you, Governor Abbot, have alienated many people in this country:  independent women, people of color, the LGBTQ community, honest Christians.  The voter manipulation in Texas has given you Republicans a continuous undeserved control of state politics but that may not be as effective in places that are not part of the former Confederacy or among Confederate wannabees.  I do know that your colleagues in other states have been working hard to manipulate voting.  Republican racism and misogyny encourage you to keep those people from casting their rightful ballots

Unfortunately, lying and cheating have become the "coin of the realm" in Republican circles and will be used to "buy" anyone susceptible, and Republican governors of Texas are susceptible.  You have used lying to try to defend indefensible positions, even to stand against the laws of our country, lying and cheating to keep certain people from voting, to claim Trump won an election he clearly lost, to cry "fraud," where there is none, to execute an innocent woman.  Truth just isn't within your playbook anymore, if it ever was. 

I hope you will choose to grant Ms. Lucio clemency, no, actually, freedom, before your lack of judgment brings about an irreversible injustice.  You won't, though, because your rabid base doesn't want you to.  They probably won't vote for you for office again if you free an innocent Latinx woman.  Shame on you and them.  Most of you all claim to be Christian, but I am not noticing any Jesus-like activity among you and your hate-filled base in Texas.  Yep!  Morally-bankrupt!

ONE-UPMANSHIP IN OUR REVENGE CULTURE

by Ruth A. Sheets

The states in the former Confederacy and Confederate wannabees are pushing to make more and more restrictive laws on their citizens, particularly those citizens who are not rich, white, straight, men. 

I know the main purpose of such laws is to gain power for those rich, white, straight, men, but it is at least as much to keep others from having power.  In the past few decades, women, people of color, and the LGBTQ community have been gaining some ground in being elected to office and holding slightly higher positions in business and industry.  The privileged white men see that as a decrease in their own power and now it is time for them to take revenge.

The most blatant actions being taken are on two fronts:  limiting or eliminating abortion and other reproductive rights for women, and limiting or eliminating voting rights for people of color.  Despite the fact that Rowe v. Wade is the "law of the land" states have defied it to pass extremely restrictive bans on what is legal.  How does that work?  I guess when rich  white straight men and the women they have recruited to their cause decree it, anything is worthy of being ignored, even the law.  As of this week, in Kentucky it is now completely "illegal" to perform or obtain an abortion, even though it is legal in this country to obtain and perform abortions.  Hmmm! 

This Kentucky event did not come from nowhere, formed whole.  Over the years, all kinds of restrictions to having a legal abortion have been tacked on.  Then when other states saw that what another state had tried and found it had worked, the original restriction was extended:  a 24 hour waiting period, then 48 hours, then 72 hours, often requiring the woman to return to the abortion center multiple times for no medical reason, while missing work or having to find child care for her kids. 

When the time extensions worked, they moved to invasive procedures before the abortion could take place:  vaginal ultrasound, lying about dangers of having abortion, forced counseling using lies and misdirection, requiring various permissions to have an abortion:  parents, husband, rapist, etc.  Those didn't prove sufficient to stop abortions, so, states declared that aborted fetuses had to be buried, abortion centers had to meet building standards that were completely unnecessary and doctors and others who performed abortions had to have privileges in local hospitals even though abortion is among the safest medical procedures performed.  Of course the hospitals in the former Confederacy and other white states would not give doctors those privileges, which they should not have needed at all.

Texas passed a law that not only banned abortions after 6 weeks when a "heartbeat" could be detected (not a heartbeat since there is no heart yet, but who cares about reality and science?), they deputized anyone anywhere to report anyone anywhere who helped a woman to obtain an abortion in Texas – vigilante law.  And, those snitches get to claim $10,000 for their reward.

A few other former Confederate states have jumped on board the vigilante wagon.  They also want to jail doctors who perform abortions for 10 years, eventually imprisoning women who have abortions too.  Missouri didn't want to stop there.  They want to put women to death for having an abortion.  That one didn't pass, but not by much. 

The Supreme Court has allowed all of these extensions of illegal abortion restrictions through refusing to hear cases or as in the Texas case, through the Shadow Docket, a sneaky way to rule on something without accountability or hearing a case, or a public ruling with the names of the justices attached.

Voting is also working its way through the one-upmanship treatment.  In 2013, John Roberts and his conservative Supreme Court decided to tear apart the Voting Rights Act of 1965 which had required states with a history of discrimination to get permission for any changes in voting policies in their state.  He, a privileged white man, claimed racism was a thing of the past in this country so . . .

Immediately, state after state in the former Confederacy returned to their discriminatory ways with a host of bills to keep the "wrong" people from voting.  When people found ways around some of the worst restrictions, new ones were introduced.  When Black people voted on Sundays as congregations, Sunday voting was scrapped.  When people who weren't the right kind of rich white male were elected, voter fraud was called.  When election workers picked up mail-in ballots from Native American reservations, laws were passed making it illegal for anyone but designated family members to hand in ballots. 

After what was nearly universally described as the best run and safest election in American history, Republicans in one state after another declared fraud and passed all kinds of additional voter restrictions from matching signatures of voters, (some signatures 50 or more years old when everyone knows people's signatures change over time), to forbidding anyone to give anyone food or drink while standing in voting lines that were designed to keep people of color waiting to vote for up to 8 hours sometimes in severe heat.  Those long lines would never happen in the areas of the state with mostly middle to upper class white people because those are the people Republicans think they can count on, and usually they can.  Besides, those white folks could cause trouble.

What has the Supreme Court done to end the one-upmanship?  Mostly nothing.  OK, they have arbitrarily allowed or disallowed gerrymandering, when gerrymandering should never be permitted in a democracy in the first place.  So far, they have permitted everything else states are doing. 

What can we the people do about the white state one-upmanship?

- We can demand that each woman has sovereignty over her own body and can make decisions for herself asking for advice and support only when she chooses. 

- Congress can stop the Rowe v. Wade challenges by codifying a woman's right to decide for herself into law.  Certifying the ERA which has been passed by the required 38 states would help too.

- Putting abortion in the realm of medicine where it belongs, monitored by medical personnel instead of ignorant vengeful politicians and judges.

- Voter registration be made automatic on the day a citizen of this country turns 18.  That would stop the challenges to the kind of license presented when a person first registered to vote because every citizen would be able to vote.

- Gerrymandering would be made illegal and every state would have an independent board to determine the maps each decade with legislative input, but not final say on the maps used.

- Election day should be a holiday and every workplace would be required to give employees paid time off to vote.  That wouldn't be a problem if every state had unrestricted vote-by-mail. 

Let's face it, racism and misogyny are alive and well in nearly every corner of this nation.  It is mostly the states of the former Confederacy and Confederate wannabees run by Republicans who are doing the most damage to the rights of women, people of color, and LGBTQ persons.  We need to call them out for their prejudices whenever possible and be sure we in other states are aware of our own biases so we are not participating in the revenge culture that demands we get even with those we think have taken what belongs to us alone.  We can do this.  It all starts with education, helping children of privilege see they don't deserve more than anyone else has, and it's OK.  Then, there's voting.

THE NEXT TARGETS

by Ruth A. Sheets

It should be unbelievable the fervor with which Republicans have jumped in recently with their anti-LGBTQ bills and laws designed to hurt children and adults, but it isn't.  Republicans have always despised the LGBTQ community, immigrants, Black Americans, well, anyone who is not white and male, and yes, rich, but not to the level they stalk these groups now. 

Republicans are pursuing this line of attack because they believe Rowe v. Wade will be overturned this summer or sooner and they are trying out (test ballooning) the next groups toward which to turn their venom.  They have to pick someone because once they lose abortion as a rallying point, they need a group to attack to maintain the attention of their base.  Hate, anger, fear, lying, cheating, and deceit have worked well for Republicans over time and are all they have.  Republicans have no positive, constructive ideas to offer.  Hell, they couldn't even support the most qualified candidate for the Supreme Court in decades because she was Black and a woman, two of their hated, feared groups. 

Republicans are regularly sending up test balloons to see which of their rights-limiting, bills and laws stick with their scared, malignant base.  Among their techniques, book banning, blaming/accusations of whatever they can dream up, "don't say "gay" acts, lying about a graduate study course Critical Race Theory taught in kindergarten, calling LGBTQ folks, and anyone they can, pedophiles, banning doctors from helping trans kids, and so much more. 

Republicans are also doubling down on women because they fear that despite their draconian anti-abortion laws, women will still find a way to get safe abortions.  Can't have that!  So, go after abortion even more strongly by wanting to criminalize everyone who thinks abortion should be a woman's decision.  In the meantime, also go after contraception, interracial marriage, and whatever comes into their pathetic white male, and white female surrogate brains. 

Can we expect help from our Congress or Federal courts?  No!  Democrats currently have among them some who are OK with all of the above and Republicans are just waiting for November when their seeds of hatred will drag their loyal base to the polls.  The courts are often willing to agree with whatever Republicans come up with (Texas abortion ban). 

One answer, we need to stop them by getting more Democrats to vote this year.  Oh wait!  I forgot, Republicans have targeted voting too, particularly voting by people of color and poor people, groups which tend to vote for Democratic candidates.  It is worth noting that if we can't stop the Republican rush to the bottom soon, we all lose, and will be paying for it indefinitely.

So, stop feeling stressed and let's get to work.  First of all, most of these attacks on women, LGBTQ persons, immigrants, and others began in the former Confederacy.  It seems those states just can't let go of the idea that certain groups are unworthy of rights and respect so, deserve white male ire.  They can make any laws they want to keep those people down.  Well, the Confederacy lost, so let's stop pretending this new iteration has anything to offer the rest of the country.  Unfortunately, the infection of dishonorable laws is spreading from its consolidation in Texas, Florida, Alabama, Mississippi, Arkansas, Tennessee, to the Confederate wannabees:  Oklahoma, Kentucky, Missouri, Idaho, and Kansas, even to the "blue" states, pushing the disgusting anti-American legislation even further.  The purpose of all this evil is to keep everyone under the control of white men and the few white women they permit a bit of power. 

Republican insurgents are running for office even though our 14^th Amendment to the Constitution forbids it.  The same thing happened after the Civil War when rich white former Confederates ran for office to drive out the Black men who had been duly elected.  Repeating history is not a good idea.

We the People need to put power into the hands of the groups targeted by Republicans.  If Republicans propose a bill anywhere in this country right now, its aim is to harm one of their target groups or to give away some good stuff to the corporations who donate to their party's candidates.  We know this, so it means we who care must stand against and when possible, ignore the laws they rubber-stamp across the former Confederacy and vaccinate Americans against this horrific political illness.

Writing to and calling legislators who are on board with the Republican hate movement and writing letters to the editor can draw attention to the illegality and anti-American positions they are taking.  Republicans are targeting our children, our schools, our churches if they are not Catholic and evangelical, and they are working to take away rights of people living in this country to make decisions for themselves.  These are the same men who often put their friends, family, and neighbors at risk because like scared little kids, they wouldn't get vaccinated for COVID-19, (definitely the easiest vaccine I have ever had).  I can't help but wonder which group will be the next target after these child-men have put down women, LGBTQ persons, people of color, and immigrants.  Will they go after each other?  

I refuse to give up hope, though.  Democrats shouldn't give up either.  Right now, nearly everything I get from candidates and people currently holding office has its primary purpose, securing donations.  I understand it takes money to run a campaign against folks who have tax loopholes and other structures to oil the Republican machinery, but more important than the money is the message.

The Democratic message should be one of practical solutions to people's  real problems.  Dems need to point out where their constituents are strong and have weathered some hard times, giving them hope they can continue strong with some positive assistance.  Constantly reenforcing people's negativity and directing their frustration at other people may win some elections, but does not solve problems.

Dems must identify real needs as well as successes, and how the people can participate in the solutions to the problems.  Start simple.  Gas prices are outrageous?  Encourage people to now and then walk to somewhere they usually take a car and point out what they might notice along the way:  the spring colors, the butterflies, the deep blue of the sky, things they can't pay attention to while driving.  Encourage folks to raise the home or office thermostat in summer to, say, 78 or 80 degrees when it is hot so it won't be such a shock when coming in from the heat.  In winter, lower the thermostat a couple of degrees below 70 and wear a sweater around the house.  Mention these as money-saving activities.  Then provide practical help to get folks through the more difficult struggles.  Regularly check in with voters to see what they actually think and what they still need.

We could fix this Republican need to do harm if we acknowledge that we are all in it together, then help people to have a more communal approach to living.  Question every bill proposed in any legislature to see who gains, who loses, who is targeted, who is doing the targeting.  That's a lot of work, but if we can stop some of the destructive bills before they even reach the floor of a legislature for a vote, we could avoid a lot of pain and suffering.  It is worth employing our humanity to protect the humanity of our fellow Americans.

Anything You Can do

September 1, 2021 is a date that will live in misogyny.  It was the day when the Texas law banning abortions after 6 weeks of pregnancy went into effect.  This law is a multi-pronged attack on women and women's bodily autonomy.

For decades, conservatives mostly Republicans and men have been focused on keeping women from positions of authority in society.  In the past this was done by keeping women pregnant.  Birth control was around, but not particularly reliable, so families with 10 and 12 children were not uncommon.  When a woman gave birth to a passel of kids, she supposedly couldn't think about education or work outside the home and she was expected to be too exhausted to argue with the man of the house for power even in her own domain.

One part of this law ignores the fact that most women don't even know they are pregnant at 6 weeks, and six weeks from when, the woman's last period?  What kind of marker is that when women ovulate at different points of their menstrual cycle?  Supposedly 6 weeks is when a heartbeat can be detected.  So, a heartbeat exists without a heart since the heart of the fetus has not yet formed by 6 weeks.  Oh, I forgot, ignore science for some kind of religious distinction of when a fetus can be counted as being alive, or something.  Some religions claim the potential of fertilization is the beginning of when life begins.  That, of course, is absurd, but back in the depths of time, before humans understood how conception occurs, and there was some understanding that after a man had sex with a woman, a baby could happen, the act was the important thing.  Men did it and caused the baby to grow so in some way, owned the "product" of that "union."  The woman was just the carrier.

Six weeks became the arbitrary line of demarcation between abortion possible and abortion impossible, in Texas, detection of some electrical impulses does it.

The law didn't stop there because abortion was not the real issue as mentioned above.  Texas legislators and governor wanted to crush any woman who chose not to be pregnant.  They instituted a vigilante apparatus to do the job.  They promised anyone who reported a woman for having an abortion after the 6-week line or even helped a woman to secure such an abortion, $10,000.  The victims of the vigilante actions had to pay that money to the reporters (sounds like post-war Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union and modern-day China, reporting on family members and neighbors.   Hmmm!  Not too democratic!)

in the days preceding Sept. 1^st, women scrambled to obtain abortions and clinics worked overtime to meet the need, but could not accommodate everyone.  Women went across borders to other states or into Mexico.  Women made arrangements for friends in other states to obtain emergency contraception and chemical abortion agents, and sent them to their Texas friends and family members.

There are no exceptions in the Texas law for rape, incest, or health of the mother.  Have an ectopic pregnancy (fetus develops outside the uterus which cannot survive) too bad.  Those Texas male legislators and the women who want to be them just don't care.  Even Supreme Court Justice Amy Barrett said a woman can drop off an unwanted child in every state.  Yep, that was a woman making such a callous comment.  Then, I guess a woman with health risks can be sacrificed because it must be "God's will." 

The Supreme Court has been conservativizing for about four decades, the long-term plan, to make abortion illegal if a state legislature wanted it to be.  Who cares about nearly 50 years of precedent giving women the right to decide about their own bodies!  The now 6-3 majority conservatives on the Court was carefully selected and groomed to stand against Rowe v. Wade.  They mostly silently let the Texas law stand (shadow docket) even though it is clearly against the law of the land.  Why would they do that?  Well, it seems to me and a whole lot of others it was done to get people used to a really bad law.  When the Court rules on the Mississippi case, heard in December last year and a ruling coming up by the end of June with an anti-Rowe v. Wade  states can do what they want  decision, the Mississippi decision will seem less draconian and protests will be minor or at least manageable ("15 years seems reasonable, right?").

Republican states have been working hard to be ready for when that decision comes down.  Mississippi is currently working with the 15 week ban which is part of the current Supreme Court case.  Florida and Oklahoma want a law like that of Texas with a few modifications.  They are considering prison time for women or doctors or someone related to an abortion.  Other states are on board with that too and several kinda like the vigilante approach too.  Therefore, the state won't actually be involved with punishing women, it will be women's neighbors who turn them in, but it is not clear to whom.  As if that were not enough, in some states' proposals, the rapist will have rights over the child of the forced birth. 

Some members of the Missouri legislature want to make abortion a capital offense and are calling for the death penalty for any woman who has an abortion whether they have the abortion in Missouri or go to another state for the procedure. 

This reminds me of the song from the Broadway musical "Annie Get Your Gun."  The characters sing "Anything you can do I can do better; I can do anything better than you."  The former Confederate states or Confederate wannabees are now in competition to see whose bill can cause more harm to women.  And, some women are participating in this misogyny one-upmanship. 

There are a lot of challenges states will face once their anti-abortion laws go into effect:

- who is going to pay for the children who are born that the mother can't afford but does not want to "drop off?"

- What about the fathers of the forced births?  We have DNA testing now, so those men can be found.  Are they going to be forced to pay child support?

- What happens when a whole lot of women choose not to have sex and "get their tubes tied" so they won't even accidentally get pregnant or will that become against the law too?

- What happens when insurance companies really face the fact that having a child is a whole lot more expensive than having an abortion, particularly if that child has serious physical impairments that require intensive care indefinitely?

- What happens when one of those legislators in Missouri has a daughter or granddaughter who has an abortion and faces the death penalty?

Since abortion is not really the issue, it is women in the world, it is essential we all start seriously thinking what the next steps will be.  One state will start the "Anything you can do I can do better" scenario and the other states will pick it up and ratchet things up.  Maybe the Democratic states need to do something similar, but  toward increasing people's rights: 

- automatic voter registration for every citizen at age 18 - vote-by-mail and election day as a holiday

- abortion on demand - abortions fully paid for

- medical coverage for all - single-payer health care

- a fair tax structure - windfall earnings taxes. 

We women and allies had better get started because the former Confederacy and friends have a head start.  But, anything they can do we can do better, right?